October 30, 2013

Gulab Jamun is one of the most loved Indian Dessert. Almost all the Indian restaurants in the US serve this sweet in their buffet. I have seen so many people enjoy this dessert and inquire about how it is prepared. My Mom used to prepare amazing gulab jamuns so I never bothered to try this. After marriage MK used to prepare equally good jamuns so I never tried to make it till now. But I always thought of making the jamuns the authentic way for a long time. When I made a list of sweets for this Diwali I surely made up my mind to try out this sweet.

Gulab Jamun is made with khoya or milk powder. But using khoya is the authentic method. You can either use the store bought khoya or make the khoya at home. It is easy to make the khoya at home but it is time consuming so I skipped that part and used store bought khoya. I was so satisfied with the results and it tasted like my Mom's preparation. If you still thinking on what to prepare for this Diwali you can surely try this. You will never regret !!

The khoya should be placed in room temperature if you are using store bought khoya.

Crush the cardamom with little sugar into a powder.

Method

Crumble the khoya into fine pieces.

Add the all purpose flour, cooking soda to the khoya.

Knead the mixture by adding slowly adding water in tsps. I used 8 teaspoons of water. Using your fingers slowly knead until it turns to a smooth dough. Do not give too much pressure to make the dough that will result in hard jamuns.

Start making small/medium size balls. The balls must be smooth to get perfect jamuns. I made 50 small balls from the dough.

While you are making the balls, boil the water and sugar together. When it starts to boil add the cardamom powder, saffron and continue to boil in medium flame for about 10 minutes. Swtich off and allow it to cool.

Heat oil, ghee in a kadai in high flame, when the oil is hot enough reduce the flame to medium-low and drop the 4 - 5 jamuns at a time. Fry carefully until the jamuns turns brown on all sides.

Drain the jamuns in a kitchen tissue and immediately drop the jamuns in the warm sugar syrup.

Repeat process with all the balls.

Add the rose water if you are using it.

Let the jamuns soak in sugar syrup for about 1 - 2 hours.

Serve the jamun warm or cold.

Notes

If you are using homemade khoya then the amount of water needed to make the dough will be very less as the homemade khoya will already be moist.

Kneading the dough smooth and making the balls smooth is very important to get perfect jamuns. If the balls have cracks on the surface they will disintegrate in the hot oil.

Do not apply pressure while making the dough or the balls.

You can also use oil and ghee in 50:50 ratio or cook the jamuns entirely in ghee.

Fry the jamuns in low to medium flame so that the jamuns are fully cooked. If you do it high flame the jamuns will quickly turn brown but will not be cooked in the inside.

The sugar syrup should be warm when you drop the jamuns.

I made the jamuns very small and got 50 jamuns out of the dough if you wish you can slightly bigger jamuns.

As I made it small they got soaked in 1 hour so I drained the jamuns and stored the jamuns and sugar syrup separately and poured the syrup on top of the jamuns while serving.

I prefer to store the jamuns in refrigerator and microwave for about 10 seconds while serving.

October 26, 2013

After making an array of sweets I decided to make one of my favorite Diwali Snack. My Mom would make this crunchy Ribbon Pakoda without fail for every Diwali.
It has been ages since I ate this. So when I made my list of snacks to prepare for this Diwali I put this on top. The excitement of Diwali starts when Mom starts with her batches of murukku one week ahead. She will store them in big stainless containers. When we come back from school and see those containers on the counter we jump in joy and enjoy them as a evening snack.

Ribbon Pakoda is a crispy and ribbon like murukku variety made for Diwali. I do not know why it is called a pakoda as it falls in the murukku family. Normally the ribbon pakoda plate would have two slots. My kitchen press had a single thin slot and the pakoda came out exactly like ribbons. My family enjoyed it so much. I asked my kids not to enter the kitchen while I was making it so my 2 year old stood out of the kitchen and was asking Mom one more, It was very cute. I had this after a long time and enjoyed it with my cup of tea !!

October 22, 2013

It is the time of the year when you sweets everywhere. Not only in India, even in the US all Indian Stores and even the American chains are selling all kind of Indian sweets. It was fun explaining the others about our sweets. When they see the calories per piece they go for a big ahhh. This year I had decided to make many sweets so that kids could enjoy eating them. One of them in my list was Roasted Gram Ladoo. This is a simple yet mouth watering recipe. I'm not a big fan of sweets but somehow like these kind of flour based ladoos.

Roasted Gram Ladoo hardly takes 20 minutes or so to prepare. I have seen some recipes with lots of ghee but I prefer to have the ladoo on the dry side. We do not like the Ladoo to be glossy with lots of ghee. The Ladoo tasted even better the second day when all the flavors were infused. The roasting of the pottukadalai brings in a nice nutty flavor to the ladoo. Make sure you include this quick and easy ladoo recipe in your list sweets for this Diwali and give your family the best and tasty Diwali !.

October 19, 2013

As Diwali the Indian Festival of lights is around the corner I planned to share some sweet recipes. Rasgulla is a Bengali sweet that is loved by everyone who have tasted it. It is not like the other Indian sweets which are loaded with ghee. They are soft, spongy balls made out of Indian Cottage Cheese and soaked in sugar syrup. I'm not a big fan of sweets but really enjoy making them. This one in particular I enjoyed making it and was more excited to click pictures. Rasgulla is a famous sweet from India. When I saw rasgulla tins stocked in costco I was super excited and thought of making it at home.

Though making rasgulla sounds like a lengthy and difficult process, it is very straight forward. If you follow the recipe you are sure to get good results. Normally they use lemon juice to curdle the milk to make the chenna. I researched a lot and decided to use curd. As lemon leaves a slight trace of smell it is better to use curd. Also there is another step which involves using ice cubes to stop curdling of the milk. This is an important step to get softer rasgullas.
You can also use a pressure cooker to cook the rasgulla. But I liked the method used here and wanted to try it. It came out perfect. Why wait try this super yummy sweet at home and impress everyone at home.

October 16, 2013

I think I have talked a lot about making lunch for kids. It is really a stressful job. You need to be extra cautious when you make them. It has to be healthy, kids should like it and it should look good and especially no masala. With all that being said, one can imagine how difficult is a mother's job. In the US normally we pack sandwiches, burgers, salad, fruits for kids lunch or better order from the school. Kids prefer that. But there are sometimes when they get bored of the breads and ask for something different. I normally prepare fried rice with french fries or something like that but this time I tried a recipe that my kid loved and came back with an empty tiffin box.

Idly or Rice cakes can be made in the night and left in the fridge. You can also chop all the vegetables in night. This saves a lot of your morning time. Just takes 5 minutes to saute things together. As it is colorful and different kids will surely love it. I normally do not add turmeric powder in the dishes I prepare for school as it gives a masala smell. Instead of adding chilly powder you can also add green chilly but remember to remove it before packing the lunch. If you need the recipe on how to make Idly, please refer to my earlier post How to make Idly. Do try and let me know how you liked it !!

October 13, 2013

This is a long weekend for us. School is closed for Columbus Day and I'm the one who is super excited. Getting them ready for school, helping her with homework makes school days hectic. We are kind of relaxed now and planned to make something to treat the kids. Badam Halwa has been in my to do list for a long time now. I wanted to make something easy and tasty and went through my drafts and selected this one. All of them at home are sweet lovers except me. The end result was perfect and everyone enjoyed it to the core.

Badam halwa is an Almond based Indian dessert made with sugar and ghee. Of course it is a high calorie sweet but it is really good once in a while. As Diwali is almost there I thought of sharing a sweet recipe that would be perfect for the occasion. It is very important to get the texture right and you get that by adding the right amount of ghee and continuously mixing the contents. It is also important to grind the almond into a smooth paste to get that smooth texture.
Normally I soak the Almond for 2 - 3 hours, alternatively you can drop them in boiling water and soak for 30 minutes or so. You got to try this rich and yummy sweet for this Diwali !!

October 10, 2013

Climate is starting to change and it rains now and then. It is that time of the year we have to take all our jackets out of the closets. This city is very cold than I expected so we need all the extra gears. We love to make our specialty South Indian tangy gravies for this kind of climate. Simple gravies with some spicy vegetable is a awesome combination. I made this for lunch only for us and enjoyed it so much. When I had it with dosa in the night, Shweets wanted to try it and surprisingly she loved it. Normally she does not show interest in these type of tangy gravies. It was finger licking good with rice and even Idly/Dosa.

Puli Kuzhambu is a tamarind based gravy. What is the difference between Kara Kuzhambu and Puli Kuzhambu? This is a common question from newbie's. In Kara Kuzhambu we add tomatoes and considerable amount of coconut. In Puli Kuzhambu both of these are generally avoided. I added little amount of coconut paste to bring down the tangy flavor in the gravy. Using pearl onions is the highlight of this gravy. You can always substitute pearl onions with normal onions but to me it is just comprising on the taste. Okra or Brinjal and best options for this gravy.Do try this authentic gravy and let me know how it turned out.